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Tuesday, July 1, 2014

A Doctor and A Catholic by Laura Archuleta

Dr. Laura Archuleta

Dr. Laura Archuleta struggled with balancing her faith with a
medical career until she saw the light. This story is excerpted from the Amazing Grace for Families.

There
never was a time in my medical career when “the birth control question” did not
hang over my head. I often wondered how my Catholic faith should impact my
medial practice.Was it okay to give
“the pill” to other women, as long as I did not use it myself? The answers did
not come easily.

By
my senior year, in college I was accepted to Creighton University School of
Medicine. But the thrill of attaining my goal was tempered with a growing
dilemma.I was a training to be a family
practice doctor, but I was also a Catholic.I had specifically chosen Creighton, a Catholic Jesuit university, to
protect my faith.Still, there
seemed to be an unwritten rule that a doctor must leave her ethical beliefs
outside the patient's exam room.Even
though I knew that contraception violated the natural law and God's plan for
marriage, was it really relevant to how I would practice medicine?

During
my second year in medical school, Art came into my life and the embers of an
earlier romance, reignited.A year-and
a-half later, on December 29, 2000, we married.Art had shared my commitment to wait until after marriage before
becoming sexually intimate.We also
agreed to learn Natural Family Planning and not use artificial birth control. I
was doing everything that I thought a “good” Catholic should do.

Birth Control Dilemma

Shortly
before graduation, I decided to dig a little deeper into my birth control
dilemma.I took on a research project
regarding whether it was morally acceptable for a Catholic physician to
prescribe contraception. The more I learned about contraception, the more
concerned I was about the side effects.Sure, most were minor, but there were also serious problems like the
risk of stroke and heart attack and a possible link to breast cancer.Fertility is not a disease, so why would we
use such powerful chemicals to suppress a natural bodily function?Doesn’t the Hippocratic oath say, “First do
no harm”?

Even
now, most women still do not understand how the pill works.Most of the time it blocks ovulation, so no
egg is released.But there are times
when ovulation does occur.In those
instances, the pill changes the lining of the uterus so that a fertilized
embryo cannot implant.This is an
abortion.I knew I could never perform
an abortion, but was this really any different?

The Scandal of Birth Control

Then
I came across the classic moral definition of a scandal is to
cooperate with another in an evil action.If contraception is evil, it stood to reason that a physician who supplies
oral contraceptives is participating in her own form of scandal.Jesus said, “It would be better for anyone
who leads astray one of these little ones who believes in me to be drowned by a
millstone around his neck in the depths of the sea.What terrible things will come upon the world
by scandal! “Woe to that man through whom scandal comes” (Mt 18:6-8).That passage came through loud and
clear.In fact, it haunted me over the
coming years.

But
I reasoned that I was not corrupting these women; they had already come into my
office with their own viewpoint.Besides, I wanted to be liked by my patients and fit in with my
colleagues and not be viewed as some kind of religious radical.

I
began my family medicine residency in Sioux City, Iowa. “I'm going to try not to prescribe the pill,” I told
myself. The first time my values were challenged was a few months into
residency.A petite, sixteen-year-old
blond came in to discuss birth control.I took a deep breath and tried to give her the kind of talk you see in
the movies where everything changes after an impassioned speech. “You are
better than that,” I firmly told her.I
talked to her about abstinence and how precious her body was.But instead of a light turning on, she only
stared at me blankly and said she would still like the pill.

Biting
back tears of failure, I hurried down the hall to another doctor and had him
prescribe the birth control my patient wanted.Instead of giving this girl a prescription in my own handwriting, she
now clutched one written by the hand of a doctor down the hall. In the end, it
was all the same, wasn’t it?

Why
was I risking my professional reputation and making myself out to be a weirdo
when the patient outcome was going to be the same either way? Some doctors
reasoned with me that birth control was the lesser of two evils: better to use
birth control than to be sixteen and pregnant.(By the way, the sixteen-year-old blond what had left with contraception
was back in the clinic the following year for pregnancy care.)

I
graduated from residency in 2004 and took a job in rural North Dakota.In the weeks before I started work, the issue
of birth control continued to nag at me.I prayed to God and often talked to myself, promising that I would tell
the business manager that I did not want to prescribe birth control.God, if
you want me to do this, you have to make me stronger, I prayed.Whenever I was face to face with the business
manger, however, I chickened out.So,
several times a week, when a patient came and asked for birth control, I
swallowed hard and quickly wrote out the prescription.But it was not an issue I could smother.My Catholic faith is such a huge part of my
identity, it kept nagging at me.

A New Attitude

After
three years in practice, I accepted a position in Bismarck as a primary care physician affiliated with St. Alexius, the area's Catholic hospital. It was a perfect opportunity to make a break with my contraceptive practices.

I
began my new practice, finally ready to stand by my values. This is a Catholic facility, I reasoned,
it should be simple to avoid birth
control.It is never that clear-cut,
though.God had given me a supportive
environment, but the final step was up to me. I do not know if I was looking for a sign, or
advice, or what, but I got onto the Internet.I landed on the Catholic Medical Association website.There, I stumbled on a familiar name.Dr. John Breheny was an ethicist I had met during
my residency in Sioux City.We attended
the same church, and I had great respect for him.Thanking the Holy Spirit for this
“coincidence,” I quickly sent him an email of my moral dilemma. Dr. Breheny
responded right away, making some very strong arguments:

“You
know that the Church teaches that contraception is wrong. … In fact, it is
harmful to women (physically, emotionally, relationally, and spiritually), and
harmful for men, families and society as well.If something is seriously wrong, then it is wrong to participate in it or facilitate the action.[Think, for a moment, if you lived in
Oregon where assisted suicide is legal.Now, most physicians are still against this.Would it be the same decision to write a
prescription for a lethal dose of narcotics (a) because this is what the
patient asked for; (b) it is legal; (c) other physicians are doing it; and/or
(d) if you didn't do it, someone else would?]In any case, again, if something is wrong, then it is wrong to
participate in it.If something is
wrong, and harmful to women, then it is not a good way to practice medicine; In
fact, it is possible to survive and thrive without prescribing [contraception]
I hope you can come to see that.I'm not
making it up.Again, I have met
physicians who have gone down this same path, and more continue to come
along.

In
short, I am arguing that not prescribing is not only the right thing to do; it
is a good thing for your patients.Having said that, I know this is not an easy decision.It clearly is easier to stay with the status
quo.Going against the current is always
hard, and our modern, American culture has a lot invested in medical control of
women's fertility.It isn't just the
personal and social values, the medical "standards of care," etc.;
there is a lot of money invested as well. But I am convinced that it is important
and necessary if we are to transform our culture with the Gospel and necessary
to serve women's health effectively.”

As I
read his words, tears filled my eyes. I felt liberated. I can only describe it
as the power of the Holy Spirit.I had
finally found the strength I needed.Within a week, I went from saying: “I do not want to do this” to clearly stating: “I
am not doing this.”The more I said it the stronger I felt.Now, my resolve has been firm for seven years.My practice is flourishing
and I love going to work every day.I've
finally learned that I can be a good doctor and
a Catholic.

Dr. Laura Archuleta is married with three beautiful
children ages 11, 9, and 5 and enjoys gardening, family time, and laughing. She
has practiced family medicine with St. Alexius in Mandan and Bismarck since
2007. Laura says here husband is a stay-at-home dad and part-time saint.

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